Now, here is a play that nobody knows. The only reason I even recall any of the characters in it is because of that awesome film The Lion In Winter (1968), and that’s not Shakespeare; it just happens to dramatize events leading up to what eventually happens in King John. I could never get enough of Peter O’Toole and Katharine Hepburn and Anthony Hopkins anyway, especially since Old Sir Tony is young and hot and playing Richard “the Lionhearted” as a closetted gay man. I mean, if I were giving off Russell Crowe Gladiatior vibes and that foppish snack Timothy Dalton entered my court, I’d be gay too.
This play is a solid and straightforward (if vaguely inaccurate and relatively boring) history. It’s one saving grace comes in the character of Philip “The Bastard (of Richard Cordelion)” Faulconbridge. In reality, he is actually Richard’s bastard son, but by an unknown mother. He is literally tagged as “Bastard” in the entire script, and he totally owns it. He has the best speeches and generally feels like the only person who has their head on straight. He’s sassy AF. He especially stands out as foil to King John, who is a whiny bitch.
We open with a contested kingship (these things are always contested it seems) in John, who was his Father King Henry II’s favorite child (how dare he choose favorites!). Richard Cordelion (“cœur de lion” aka “the Lion Hearted”) died and John took over instead of his older bro Geoffrey’s son, Arthur,which goes against the rules of primogeniture. It’s a whole mess. The French Ambassador arrives and says King Philip thinks John’s claim is shit and that he should give it up for Arthur. John, of course, backed by his mum Elinor, says absolutely NOT and sends the Ambassador away. Elinor tells John that she saw this coming and that he should have handled this more diplomatically.
Two brothers, Robert Faulconbridge and Philip “the Bastard,” show up asking the King to solve their land dispute. Philip is elder, but a bastard, and doesn’t deserve the lands of their father. Elinor and John comment that Philip looks an awful lot like Richard Cordelion, and it is suspected that Philip’s mom slept with Richard at some point. Elinor suggests that if Philip relinquishes his claims on the lands, he can be knighted. He’s like “Hell yeah!” and goes for it. Philip’s mother shows up, super pissed that her name is being slandered, but she ultimately admits that Richard seduced her that one time and Philip is definitely Richard’s son.
In France, outside of Angiers, King Philip and the Duke of Austria are supporting Arthur as England’s king and plan to attack the town in his name, but they’re waiting on what the embassy from John says. King John shows up with an army, saying he’ll never give up the throne. The two kings angrily debate John’s claim, and Elinor and Constance (Arthur’s mother) snipe at each other the whole time. They ask the townspeople to give their opinion and they are just like “Uh no way we’re getting in the middle of this.” (At this point, Jerry Springer probably would have ordered a paternity test.) The French and English armies go off into the field to fight each other, but they come back and both insist that they have victory.
Philip the Bastard rolls his eyes and says that both sides should just raze the city already. The Kings agree to this, and the townspeople all go “WAIT WAIT WAIT hold up a minute!” and suggest that John’s niece Blanch is such hot stuff that if John marries her to the Dauphin, everyone will be happy. The Dauphin gets a look at Blanch and is like “How’s it goin’?” and the Kings agree this is perfect. The Bastard gives his famous speech about “commodity” and how hilarious it is that these dumbasses are willing to give up their integrity for self-interest.
Constance spends a good deal of time whining about how King Philip and Austria totally reneged on their oath to Arthur and she literally just slumps on the ground like a five-year-old having a tantrum in Wal-Mart over Doritos. The Kings waltz in to try to talk her down, but she just rails on Philip and Austria. Austria says she’s lucky she’s a lady or he’d beat her senseless, but the Bastard claps back at Austria for his insults. John tells the Bastard “Whoa, nelly, hold up” right when Pandulph, the Pope’s rep shows up. He says because John took too long to pick an archbishop, the Pope demands that Langton of Canterbury be the guy. John hates this idea, and gets instantly excommunicated, to Philip’s dismay. Constance loves this, and Pandulph orders Philip to renounce any loyalty to John. Blanch is aghast, as she just got hitched to Lewis the Dauphin and now her loyalty has to be split between her husband and her uncle. Everybody is ready to battle it out.
Goddamn, what the Ricki Lake is going on?
On the fields of Angiers, battle rages and the Bastard kills Austria, John captures Arthur, and Elinor is safe from the French. John tells Arthur that he’ll take extra special care of him and hands him over to Hubert. Then he tells the Bastard to return to England to scour the churches for riches to pay for this whole debacle. In a sly discussion, John feels Hubert out and ultimately orders him to murder Arthur. Hubert agrees.
The French begin licking their wounds. The loss of Arthur drives Constance up the wall. Pandulph says that John’s killing Arthur and stripping the Church of cash will piss off the English commonwealth enough that they’d be open to Lewis making a claim to the throne through Blanch. Lewis is cool with this and decides to figure out a way to convince Philip.
Hubert shows Arthur a note saying he needs to burn out Arthur’s eyes (WHAAT), but Arthur’s pleas are too much for him and his soft soft heart and Hubert lets him go free and says he’ll just lie and tell John that Arthur is dead.
John crowns himself king a second time, despite everyone standing around awkwardly telling him this is totally unnecessary. They then ask “Hey how about freeing Arthur?” and John is like “Yeah sure why not?” just as Hubert arrives to say “BT dubs, Arthur is dead, just like you told me.” Everyone accuses John of being a horrid MURTHERER and they leave. A messenger says that Elinor and Constance are dead now and John flips out, completely lost without his mommy. The Bastard comes in and says he’s got all the money he stole from the monasteries and how everyone is pissed and people are believing Pomfret’s prophecy that John will lose his crown on Ascension Day. John is 100% DONE and locks Pomfret up, sends the Bastard to try convincing his nobles to get back on his side, then wails at Hubert, blaming him for killing Arthur even though Hubert reminds him that “Hello, you’re the one who told me to kill Arthur… and also, I lied, he’s actually alive.” John orders Hubert to go tell the nobles.
Arthur disguises himself and tries to escape the castle by jumping off its wall and SURPRISE he dies. The nobles just happen to walk by, talking about hooking up with Lewis, but the Bastard runs up to them and says “Hey Arthur is alive!” just as they all find dead Arthur, which is totes awk AF. Hubert catches up with them and says “Arthur is alive!” because it couldn’t get anymore awkward, and they try to kill Hubert but the Bastard stops them even though everyone still thinks he killed Arthur.
Ascension Day arrives and John offers Pandulph his crown, but Pandulph politely says “No, brah, keep it for now, and I’ll do you a solid as long as you fall in line with the Pope.” John thanks him and Pandulph goes to persuade Lewis not to attack England. The Bastard tells John that Arthur is dead after all and John is shook. The Bastard is pissed that John agreed to submit to the Pope, and that Pandulph has a snowball’s chance in hell of convincing Lewis to back off. John says “K let’s prep for war then.”
Lewis and John’s nobles gang up against John just when Pandulph comes to try and tell them “Everything’s fine, you don’t have to do this, let’s be friends.” Lewis is offended that they think John’s making peace with Rome has anything to do with him and France. The Bastard comes in and upon learning that war is coming, he just cracks on Lewis as best he can.
John comes down with Coronavirus or something and the battle is raging against him. The Bastard sends a message that the French are falling back because their reinforcements never showed up, so John goes to Swinstead Abbey even though all the monks in the country hate his guts.
The English nobles panic. Lord Melune gives a drawn-out death speech about Lewis swearing he will kill all the nobles if they crap out on him right now, and they all decide to crawl back to John.
Lewis thinks he is still winning, then he finds out that Melune died and that the nobles all went back to John and the reinforcements are a no-show, but he still pledges to fight the next day.
Hubert finds the Bastard in the night and whispers to him that John has been (SHOCK) poisoned by a monk! And also the nobles have returned alongside John’s son Prince Henry. In the orchard outside Swinstead Abbey, peeps are congregating to see John before he kicks it. They carry him into the orchard, thinking getting some fresh air will be nice. John knows he’s done for, and the Bastard comes to his side to say his farewells, but lets slip that Lewis has rallied and he’s coming for England. John croaks. The Bastard vows revenge on Lewis, but then he’s told that Lewis is suddenly suing for peace and has gone home. Prince Henry is named the next King and the Bastard gives a pretty great patriotic speech that’s both more concise and less overwrought than what will come out of Henry V’s mouth in the future (but we all love his chest-thumping peeches anyway). The end.
Old William and his contemporaries clearly didn’t think much of John, and neither do many pop cultural portrayals of him. He’s the douchebag Robin Hood has to overthrow, after all, as we all love Robin Hood.
It’s a little unfair because all the BS John dealt with at the end of his reign led to the sealing of the peace treaty known as the Magna Carta. Granted, the Pope annulled the first draft of it, but John’s son, Henry III, reissued it a year later, and then again several years after that, and many kings afterwards reissued it as well, each time revising it to make more sense to all involved. Ultimately, it turned into one of lawyers’ and scholars’ favorite documents because it was an historic constitutional forerunner that protected ancient individual liberties such as illegal imprisonment, tax restrictions, and swift justice.
Shakespeare most likely left out this *tiny* detail because, hello, Elizabeth I was always wary of the threat of rebellion and Shakespeare’s plays were clearly written with a distinct level of Tudor propaganda. Monarchs at the time still believed in the divine right of kings and something like a compromise with the commonwealth was icky to them. They didn’t want to admit that anything remotely beneficial could come of rebellion against your monarch. But by playing up King John’s rebellion against the papacy, he stoked English nationalism in his audiences. Clever, eh? A bit of literary alchemy.
Next week, we delve into another failed reign, but a much more poetic one, in Richard II. The entire play is written in verse, and it’s spectacular. SQUEEEEEE!
For now, I leave you with a snippet of one of the earliest known filmic records of any Shakespeare play. It was originally a four-minute scene from a stage production of King John, but this is all that's survived since 1899. Enjoy some history:
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